Posts Tagged ‘seasonal’

I begin this writing in my 9th spring on this bit of land, right after the spring equinox in March, during the year of our Lord 2010. I hope that in reading about the goings on here, our triumphs and trials, you may learn things along the way that help you out in your own endeavors.

I will start off by saying that, if you are trying to do any kind of farming for a living, even at its best, it is anything but the “simple life”! Whenever you are working with plants, animals, dirt, water, seasons and the weather and trying to control same, no matter how much you plan you can never predict the outcome. I am the first person to say I would never tell anyone else how to run their farm – we all must do what works for us – but I will share with you how I run mine.

I’ve found that it’s always best to have a plan A and a plan B so when plan A does not go like you thought it should (and a lot of the time it doesn’t) sometimes you must go to plan B (salvage what you can and learn from it). Oh, and then there is plan C… That is when both plan A and B go awry and it’s time to realize that sometimes no matter what you do, or how much you plan, or how hard you try, you just can’t control plants, animals, dirt, water, seasons and the weather. That’s just reality, folks.

One of the very first things I planted here was a pair of avocado trees- 1 Hass and 1 Fuerte. The Hass having the best flavor, and the Fuerte, a tree that produces a heavy crop ever other year, would be the pollinator. I did my research. I would have a plethora of heavenly “alligator pears” for guacamole in no time. I would be the envy of all who knew me. I went to the nursery and spent on the upwards of $80.00 (and this was 9 years ago!). I dug two nice deep holes, lined them with compost, chucked in a handful of goat-o’s and planted!

For three months my dear little trees reveled under my care… then came the frost…and my little dears had brown crunchy tips on their leaves. Ok – plan B – I mulched around them with a heavy layer of straw. No luck. The frost continued, and now they looked like little brown crunchy cornflakes. I even went to the trouble of making them little Reemay coats, and putting whole bales of straw around as a wind block. Alas, my little trees gave up the ghost, and my dreams of being the avocado queen were lost forever. The land imparted to me what it would let me grow here, and what it would not. On to plan C…sigh….

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